Many of us take nature for granted and never stop and enjoy the energy it offers. The leaves that change color to the beauty of the ivory flakes that descend on our front yards. Well Taiwanese native Yalan Wen uses nature as her focus to create her amazing artwork. She manifested her love for nature by observing its magic and investigated what lurks beneath the surface of their origins.
“I grew up surrounded by nature, and by observing it from a different angle, I found that nature includes infinite questions and answers. I love the pattern of the leaves, trees, clouds, the reflection of light, the movement of waves, etc. There’s something about it that makes me feel connected.”
Yalan would follow her dreams and completed an MFA Computer Arts program at the School of Visual Arts in Manhattan. Her work is a fusion of creative programming, experimental music composition and moving images. She has worked in many mediums be it drawing, painting and mostly computer graphics. At her current stage she likes to create her works with both physical materials and digital tools. One example is her video art piece “Cascade” which when it was shown it was displayed on a high-quality tv screen, so the color was rich and didn’t affect the surrounding light too much.
So far, she has been involved in many exhibitions and screenings in the NY area like “Elements” at West Harlem Art Fund, New Filmmakers New York 2023 and online shows like the Making The Way SVA Gallery Juried Exhibition. One of her memorable ones was when she participated in the CADAF Art Fair at Web3 gallery which gave her a different perspective on the digital art world. The curators of the show Andrea Steuer and Elena Zavelev gave her a great opportunity to be a part of it. She also had a residency at the Visual Muze during the summer of 2021.
Yalan was also part of the film festivals where they integrated her artwork into a film or show. Her video works were screened at festivals like Strangelove, Acorazado, and PUNTO y RAYA Festival, and has been shown at important venues such as SIGGRAPH Art Gallery, Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts, Governors Island, GOXR and more. It offered her exposure in a different space. She had also earned many awards for her work like the MFA Computer Art Department Award at SVA, GYGABYTE Gold Medal Award, Kaohsiung Award 2022 and others. Presently, she would like to tackle a large-scale installation and a larger space to work in. For the moment she is working on pieces that combine sound and visuals and is currently sketching out ideas in her notebook.
WEBSITE: yalanwen.com
